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The Dodgers will have a new television play-by-play voice for road games in 2016: Joe Davis.

Davis, 27, is already a veteran of several national MLB, college football and college basketball telecasts on Fox Sports. He’ll call 50 games on SportsNet LA with Orel Hershiser, Nomar Garciaparra and dugout reporter Alanna Rizzo next season.

“Joe Davis has put together an outstanding play-by-play resume,” Dodgers chief marketing officer Lon Rosen said in a statement. “We are thrilled to have one of the top young sports broadcast talents in the nation join our great television team.”

Davis is scheduled to call Saturday’s college football game between Washington and Utah on Fox Sports.

If you can’t wait that long, I did a quick YouTube search for some of Davis’ clips and came up with this high school football game from 2012 on ESPN:

Charley Steiner is slated to do play-by-play on the 31 road telecasts that Davis doesn’t call. Vin Scully will call all 81 home games. I’m told he might do some road games as well, likely close to home (Anaheim, San Francisco, etc.), though that hasn’t been determined yet. Scully’s schedule wasn’t announced until spring training last year.

According to Bloomberg.com, Comcast will drop its bid to merge with Time Warner Cable amid growing opposition to the $45 billion deal in Washington.

Writes Alex Sherman:

Comcast is planning to make a final decision on its plans Thursday, and an announcement on the deal’s fate may come as soon as Friday, said one of the people, who asked not to be named discussing private information.

Time Warner is currently the sole carrier of the Dodgers’ television network, SportsNet LA, in Southern California. Many have debated the ripple effect of a merger — as it pertains to baseball and other facets of society — in recent months. Had the merger been approved, all Charter cable customers in Southern California would have had access to SportsNet LA, which is currently available to only an estimated 30 percent of the local market.

The merger was seen as central to the Dodgers’ strategy of improving SportsNet LA’s distribution. There certainly had to be a Plan B. Soon enough, we might even find out what that plan is

OK, let’s start with the reaction to today’s news. That’s easier to explain than the news itself.

If you are a Dodgers fan who can’t get SportsNet LA on your television at home, your rooting interest in the proposed Time Warner Cable-Comcast merger is simple. You want the merger resolved quickly, one way or another. If the merger is approved, a separate transaction would be approved that would put SportsNet LA in the home of every Southern California Charter cable subscriber. If it isn’t approved, Time Warner and DirecTV are more likely to resume negotiations over SportsNet LA (there have been no negotiations to report lately).

So, either way, a swift resolution to the merger brings the Dodgers closer to more televisions.

Vin Scully is coming to Arizona to broadcast the Dodgers’ March 27 game against the San Francisco Giants. (Associated Press photo)

SportsNet LA announced Thursday that it will televise 31 of the Dodgers’ 35 spring training games.

Vin Scully will call four spring training telecasts: all three Freeway Series games, April 2-4 against the Angels, and a game against the San Francisco Giants on March 27 in Glendale, Arizona. Charley Steiner will be joined by analysts Rick Monday, Kevin Kennedy and Orel Hershiser during the other SNLA broadcasts.

Currently, four Dodgers split-squad games will not air live: March 20, 21 and 29 against the Texas Rangers, and March 6 against the Brewers. The games March 20 and 21 are to be played indoors at the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas. The March 6 game is scheduled to air on MLB Network on a delay. This broadcast will not be blacked out by SportsNet LA, according to a spokesperson for the network.

MLB Network previously announced that it is broadcasting three Dodgers Cactus League games live: March 5 vs. the White Sox, March 11 vs. the Cubs and March 12 vs. the Padres. However, these games will be blacked out in SportsNet LA markets.

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